I hear you knockin'....

I've been practicing some of my stuff for a poetry slam.  I still need work getting comfortable in front of a microphone and crowd.

VI

Mirror, mirror.......

....on the wall...

Well, another Friday night and another evening of prepping my life for moving forward.  Hanging at the house doing chores and trying to get my shit together, listening to the radio and chilling out Shroomy style.  I am getting the regular barrage of calls from buddies trying to figure out what is going on for the evening and shooting them all down like predators in a singles bar.  Live band at the Watering Hole?  No, but thank you.  Latest movie release at the multiplex?  Not tonight, thanks.  Shoot some stick at the pool hall?  Not tonight, man, sorry.  You want some company, at your place?  I appreciate it, but I'll pass this time.

Just me in my habitat.  Nice to just unwind alone occasionally.

These are some of the things I'd like to do around my house...

and maybe a bit of this...

 

 

and I'd have to get a cat, which isn't likely, but maybe just so I could do this...

 

 

 

probably one of these instead...

and I wrote this recently...

One of Those Days

By stu pidasso

9October2013

 

I walk tenderly about her

For she is delicate today

I see it in her body language

I know what not to say

I know the little things

That will help to ease her pain

I pick flowers in the garden

Brought by the recent rain

I make sure the dishes are done

And I dust the up high stuff

I put on some Jack Johnson

As his music is not too rough

I light the sandalwood incense

And let the wisps flavor the air

Like a cat she might hesitate

So that I may stroke her hair

Her mood hangs over the house

Like gray clouds seeping mist

And at some point I know

That she’ll want to be kissed

If I ease in slow and steady

As she lays in the bed to think

She may let me paint her toenails

In her favorite pastel pink

But before I deftly brush

the polish on each nail

I massage her pixie feet

For an extended spell

One more day I sacrifice

The time I have at hand

In order to keep happy

The prettiest girl in all the land

For even with the occasional

Grey and foreboding day

A life time spent with her

Is better than the other way



 

V

Driven

I am having problems with my drive.  When I say "drive", I mean ambition.  My mind says "Run, get fit, loosen up and knock some pounds off the waist line", but my body says "No".  My spirit says "Yes!", but again, my body says "NO!".

 

I went to practice tonight, and I got some early running done, but my body started acting up.  Once I stepped out to get myself composed, I could not get back into practice.  I stood around and watched the younger guys getting their reps done, and some of the older players like myself were getting it done, too.

 

But my body is just not cooperating.

 

That is when my spirit started to wane.  Depression set in very quickly, and so I left.

 

We all have drive.  We all are driven by different motivations.  Some of us chase the dollars.  Some of us chase our dreams.  But we all chase something.  Even if chasing idleness is the choice, some are driven to do nothing.

 

I have got to stay focused on the things I want to accomplish.  Getting fit, getting educated, and being happy; or as I like to remind myself....mind, body, spirit.

 

I had the mind and the spirit tonight, but the body just wasn't going to happen easily.

 

I was about to say "I'll try again tomorrow.", but no!  I will try again tonight!  I will work on some cardio and stretching when I get home, before I go to bed.  For I AM the master of my fate.  I AM the captain of my soul.

 

Last year about this time I was focused on this.....

 

 

My lil’ Squeeze

By stu pidasso

26Feb2013

 

Won’t you hold up, please, my lil’ squeeze?
Can’t you see I’m pleading from my knees?
Do you really want to part company like this?
At least I have the memory of our kiss.

Ce, do you think this is puppy love?
Do you think we’re meant to somehow rise above?
Could you forget or at least forgive that big mistake?
I guess I can’t eat and also have my cake.

Cate, can you tell me why you cheated with him?
Was it thought out well or was it acting on a whim?
Did you just grow tired of our steady routine?
No problem, baby, I hope you enjoy your new scene.

Won’t you hold up, please, my lil’ squeeze?
Can’t you see I’m pleading from my knees?
Do you really want to part company like this?
At least I have the memory of our kiss.

Jessie, wait a second, are you sure you have to go?
Are you sure you don’t still have some love to show?
Are you sure I can’t carry you across that threshold?
No worries, my love will never grow cold.

Marla, why’d you have to pack up and go away?
Why’d you leave this lonely boy by himself to play?
Are you sure we can’t still be a happy family?
It’s okay, I’m getting used to heartache, you see.

Won’t you hold up, please, my lil’ squeeze?
Can’t you see I’m pleading from my knees?
Do you really want to part company like this?
At least I have the memory of our kiss.

Ce, do you think of me now and then?
Do you regret telling me about your new boyfriend?
Do you know that sometimes I still dream of you?
It’s alright; I’ve learned to be nobody’s fool.

Mary Jane, why are you still holding my heart?
Do you ever dream of our lives apart?
Does this life with me ever leave you wanting more?
At my house you’ll always find an open door.

Won’t you hold up, please, my lil’ squeeze?
Can’t you see I’m pleading from my knees?
Do you really want to part company like this?
At least I have the memory of our kiss.

And I was eating this...

 at this place...

 

What drives you?

IV

Blind date....sort of

This is a draft I had left over from a few years ago....

Let me start by saying that I was the typical high school teenager. I had low self-esteem and no sense of what life was about. I did not have the right clothes or drive the right car (I had no car for that matter) and I did not hang-out with the "in" clique. In fact, I am going to warn you all that I was raised more by my five oldest brothers than my mom or dad.

I feel that this has been a huge hurdle for me for the majority of my younger life (unlike now, where I realize I have life by the balls and am squeezing unmercifully). About the only thing I had going for me were my boyish good looks (thanks dad!!).

My junior year in high school, I was dating a girl that I had known since we were freshmen students. Annette was a lot like me. She came from a family that was not one of the hobnobbing clans from the north side of town. We always debated whose family was more dysfunctional (I see now that her family wins hands down). We were both used to hand-me-downs and sharing anything we had with siblings. She was (and is still) sweet. Unfortunately, I was full of the raging hormones with which most high school aged boys were inflicted.

I got hit up at my locker one day, by a cute girl that I knew from my geometry class. Christy was a sophomore and did come from the other side of town (but that matters not to the soldiers of hormone). She thought I was cute and funny and she said all the right things (I don't really remember what she said as much as that I remember that she was interested in me). So we made a date to get together and spend some time getting to know each other. That was my first mistake.

Well, the weekend rolled around and I made my way across town to where she lived. I stole up to the front door and rang the bell. Christy came to the door and let me in and we settled into the front room on the couch. To my amazement, she was home alone and was waiting for me to show up. Her parents (and siblings?) had gone out to see a matinee movie and we would be alone for a few hours. It did not take much for me to realize that she wanted to play. First we kissed. All the regular kissing moves and then two new ones (to me).

What transpired after that is not important (a lady never tells and a gentleman never asks), but let us just say that I got my feet a little more wet than I had had them before. Those wet feet turned to cold feet and I managed to talk my way out of doing anything that most boys my age were dying to do. That was my second mistake.

The rest of the weekend was apparently uneventful, because I did not suddenly take up journaling so I could record the unremembered memorable moment. But when I got back to school the next week, things had changed.

Somewhere in the five days of classes between Sunday and Saturday, Annette had a conversation with Christy. I, being the more than averagely dumb boy, didn't take into account two things. One, that high school is small and everybody knows everybody through somebody else. And two, these two girls might actually share a class together. That was my third mistake.

Well, they did share a class together and when Christy was telling her friends in class about the cute boy and what they had been doing and WHAT HIS NAME WAS, Annette overheard the whole thing. Needless to say, there was hell to pay, but that doesn't make this story go away. These two girls compared notes and decided that I needed to learn a lesson. So as I waited patiently at Annette's car for her to come out for our lunch date, I see both the girls walking up to me with smiles on their faces. Oh, I wish I had a crack or crevice or somewhere to crawl off to at that point, but no. I got to ride stuck in between the girlfriend and the girl friend. And it wasn't some nirvana setting where the three of us would go roll around in a pile of sweaty teenage lust doing things that boys daydream of, no it was hell. Torturous. Uncomfortable as all get out. They made me twist in my discomfort for the entire lunch period. I even got to pay for the lunches (fair enough).

But as fate would have it, I could salvage nothing from either one of them. I was never to share time with Christy again (not so much a problem for me, as she just didn't interest me as Annette did) and I lost Annette as a girlfriend for the rest of our school careers.  We ended up dating again (off and on for twenty years) but much later. And letting her go was my last and worst mistake.

Now I am back home, helping my mother, taking care of my house. I just moved home from Austin, Texas; where I had moved to be closer to my kids and to Annette. But when I got relocated to Austin, Annette broke the news to me that she was in another relationship and just couldn't bear to tell me (until I was standing on her doorstep).

Finis. Kaput. Over. Done. Bye-bye. Ciao. Adios, y vias con Dios, mi amiga. I swear all my love to my latest and best girl-friend ever, Mary Jane. I will stray no more, and always be true. I work as hard as I can so that I can go home to her waiting arms each and every night.

 

Lately, though, I have been up to this...

 

and this....

and even wrote this recently...

Ode to John

By stu pidasso

17Nov2013

We are all just temporary

Like the sighting of a garden faerie

Gusts of wind swept across the land

Bubbles chased by laughing child’s hand

We are butterflies and flutterbies

Sent to give smiles and heal cries

Spur of the moment lover’s lies

Whispered softly to fawning eyes

We are raging flames in bonfire

Fleeing skyward from funeral pyre

Sparkling morning dew on grass

Specters briefly haunting looking glass

We are the fading wolf’s midnight moan

cacophonous busy signal tone

smoke drifting from extinguished match

sea turtle eggs at beachfront hatch

We are melodic mocking bird song

Here for the time, but not for long

So do not live a life cautious and wary

For we are all just temporary

 

 

for this guy...

 

 

III